


A Question of Lineage

by icarus_chained



Category: Dungeons & Dragons - All Media Types, Original Work
Genre: Crimes & Criminals, Draconic Sorcerers, Dragons, F/M, Gen, Green Dragons - Freeform, Inspired by Dungeons & Dragons, Lineage, Organized Crime, Original Fiction, Shapeshifters - Freeform, bloodlines
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-08
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-14 03:09:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29910537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icarus_chained/pseuds/icarus_chained
Summary: Aline had run away from herlegitimate guildmasterfamily to be an adventurer as soon as she realised that she couldn't be the sort of person they needed her to be. Unfortunately, adventuring didn't turn out to be much easier on the morals, although it did come with some friendships.Returning for her mother's funeral, a conversation with Tante Arsenia, the family's vicious old advisor for as long as anyone could remember, puts ... quite a few things in perspective.
Relationships: Diero Falone/Tante Arsenia, Original Female Character/Original Male Character
Comments: 12
Kudos: 48





	A Question of Lineage

**Author's Note:**

> Or, one of a few ideas I had for a draconic sorcerer meeting their draconic ancestor

“Don’t listen to that idiot brother of yours, dear heart. You’re no stain on Diero’s lineage. Trust someone who knows, hmm?”

A figure stepped calmly and smoothly from the shadows to the left of the fireplace, her hollow, cadaverous face lifted to the great portrait above the mantel. Aline stuttered back a step before her brain caught up with her eyes, recognising that harm was unlikely to come attached to the bony features now beside her.

Well. Harm was unlikely to come to _her_ , anyway. Other people might be less reassured by the sudden appearance of ‘Tante Arsenia’, the most feared guild shadow chancellor in the city.

Aline, though, had grown up with her, which made her mostly immune. _Mostly_.

“… Tante?” she asked warily. “I’m sorry. What did you say?”

Their family’s oldest advisor cocked an eye at her, a half-second glance that would have scathed even the fiercest of the family enforcers. It might even have shut Michello up for a second, though Aline wouldn’t bet on that as firmly as she might once have. Her brother had become … a lot less prone to reason in the years since she’d left.

Or maybe only since their mother died. Maybe it was only a few days old, this new Michello. She wouldn’t bet on that either, though.

“You haven’t gone deaf in your travels, girl,” the old woman said bitingly. “I’d have heard. My people haven’t been climbing in your ear at night or anything, but I have been keeping decent track.”

Been keeping …

Aline swallowed. Ah. Of course. Of course she had. Mother and Michello might have been content to let her go own way, write her off as a bad job and forget she existed, but Tante Arsenia would never be so careless. Nothing to do with this family ever escaped Tante’s notice. Not even runaway daughters earning themselves a bad name as an adventurer.

A _good_ name, actually. Depending on who you talked to. But her family had always had a somewhat skewed definition of ‘good’. Hence Michello’s accusation earlier.

Aline was suddenly very glad she’d left Pierre and Quelenna at the inn. She didn’t want to know what they’d think of her if they actually saw what she’d come from. _Who_ she’d come from.

“… I said,” Tante repeated suddenly. As if she’d somehow heard the thought, and wanted to stomp on it. She _might have_. They’d all wondered that as kids. “You’re no stain on Diero’s line, my darling. Your brother doesn’t have the first clue about this family’s history. I wouldn’t go to _him_ for any insight into what your ancestors may or may not have thought.”

Her voice was rich and thick with contempt. If Michello had been in the room, he’d have been struck down where he stood, poisoned by the very sound of it.

Or he’d have tried to kill her. Tante Arsenia. And wouldn’t _that_ have been a thing to see.

Preferably, Aline couldn’t help but think, from a very safe distance.

“… He’s the head of the family, now,” she said quietly. Drifting a little closer to the older woman. “Head of the guild. His opinion’s the one that matters now, isn’t it?”

Arsenia snorted coldly. “In his puerile little dreams,” she said flatly. “He’s afraid of you, dear heart. You’re the eldest. Your father’s heir. If you hadn’t run off, you’d be in the office now, not him. If you decided to stick around, you still could be. He lives in fear of that. He knows he’s little match for you in a fight. Or in magic. Or in a popularity contest, come to that.”

She said it easily. Flatly and without inflection, like a strategist relaying facts. No opinion either way. Aline shook her head rapidly anyway.

“No,” she said. “I don’t … I’m sorry, Tante. I know this family is your life. The guild. I just … I can’t do things … I’m not you, or even Michello. I don’t do things this way. I can’t. I’m sorry.”

The old advisor studied her. Weighed her with a flat, impassive look. Unperturbed and icy as the Petumno River in winter. Long enough that Aline started to call up all the exits from the room, and every teleportation magic she had to hand. But Arsenia blinked, after a minute. Placid, almost reptilian, and casually looked away again.

Looked _up_ again. At the portrait. The representation in oils of Diero Falone, the founder and first head of their family. At least as it was now. Guildmasters. Lords of the City. ‘People of note’. Diero had been the start of that.

Before him, they’d mostly been your bog-standard Pettante criminals. Diero had made them _legitimate_.

“You’d be surprised what ways this family has done things,” Arsenia said finally. Softly, a little distantly. Enough that Aline stared at her. She’d never heard a tone as soft as that from the old … there were all sorts of rumours. Poisoner. Assassin. Cast-iron bitch. There were no ends of rumours around Tante Arsenia. Almost none of them were _gentle_.

“… What do you mean?” she asked quietly. Inching closer, half in curiosity and half … some strange need to offer something. Solidarity. An ear. Something. It was an odd sensation. Nothing in her childhood had ever given her the idea that _Tante Arsenia_ would ever need any such thing.

The old woman flashed a smile at her. A strange smile. Somehow both soft and vicious.

“He was a romantic, you know,” she said, with fond and ancient amusement. “Diero Falone. Vicious, of course. He never would have survived long if he hadn’t been vicious. A more wonderfully savage gentlemen you’ve never met. The things he did and arranged to have done to his enemies were absolutely legendary. A finer criminal and crime boss this city has never produced. All of that we tell people, at least the right people, and all of that is true. What we don’t say … is that he was a romantic, for all of that. A fool at heart. We don’t tell the story anymore, but he gave it all up for a woman. The foolish dreams of a foolish heart. If fate and that same woman hadn’t turned his way, our beloved founder would never have lived past thirty-five.”

She reached up a hand. Brushed the frame of the portrait gently. A possessive little pat.

“We all make our own rules, dear heart,” she said gently. Turning to Aline once more. “From the very start, we’ve all been making it up as we go. It’s just a game. The city, the world, everything. It’s all just a game. We all choose how we play. What rules we want to set. What handicaps we wish to give ourselves, to test our skills against. Every last member of this family has chosen their own rules. All the way to the start. What matters is what you have, and what you want, and how you choose to turn one into the other. The only victory is whether you live or die. And if you live, the only one scoring your efforts will be you. Or at least, the only one who matters.”

Aline … stared at her. For a long moment. There was … a lump in her throat. She thought … there’d been something almost bordering on _approval_ , in that. Or at least … not _dis_ approval. It was more … more than anyone in the family had ever …

“You … don’t disapprove, do you?” she asked finally. The smallest of voices, like the little girl she’d once been. She’d always … Tante Arsenia had always been such a legend. To all of them. She’d always wanted … “You don’t … disapprove of what I am?”

Arsenia laughed. A dark little chuckle. “Oh, I disapprove of a lot of things,” she said. “Your choice of allies, for example, is what I would call a _long shot_ at best. The elf alone has such a fascinating history. You make more enemies with a single ally than most of your ancestors have managed on their own merits. I assume you _are_ aware of that.”

Aline had _better be_ , was the not-so-subtle implication. Tante Arsenia did not approve of sloppy work. But Aline nodded hastily. _Darkly._ Quelenna … Yes. She knew Quelenna’s history. All of it.

And it made not one scrap of difference.

“She’s not my ally,” she said quietly. Not like a little girl, now. Not in need of any approval. “She is my _friend_ , Tante. And I’ll have no questions on that.”

The old woman blinked at her. And then she _grinned_. A terrifying, distinctly _toothy_ expression. She reached up to pat Aline’s cheek lightly. To brush … the faint scales on the edge of her cheek. The _other_ legacy of their lineage. One half crime, and one half magic.

“You really are the spit of him, my dear,” she murmured. “More than any I’ve seen in decades. You’re the very image of my Diero. All spite and cleverness. Defiance. And blind, foolish loyalty. Down to your bones. I’ve not seen another of our line more his image than you.”

My Diero. _My_ Diero. Aline … swallowed harshly. Arsenia noticed. Of course she did.

“ _Tante_ ,” Aline breathed. Half terror and half awe. The old woman smiled. Softly, and with all the gentle savagery of their line.

“I’ve not told anyone,” she said, her eyes slowly turning yellow. Reptilian. “Not for nearly two centuries now. Not any of our children. But you, dear heart. You had so much of us. Right from the start. My magic. My poison, my skill. Deep in your veins. But Diero’s heart. Always. From the very first, Diero’s heart.”

Her magic. Her poison, her skill. There was a dragon somewhere in their line. They’d always known it. The magic didn’t lie, nor the scales either. The Falone line had dragon’s blood somewhere in it.

The Falone line had a _dragon_ in it. Even now. Even still.

“He loved me, you know,” the dragon who called herself Tante Arsenia said quietly. “As a woman, first. We were … opponents in the game. He was a force of chaos in my city. A new player in the game, upsetting the whole board. Of course I had to learn about him. Enemies and allies. Lovers. Any face that did the job. You know I nearly killed him? One of my faces was the head of a rival gang. He was no better than a gang lord, back then. I nearly killed him so many times. But one part of me. A face among many. She took a different line. She loved him. Or professed to, at least.” She smiled crookedly. “Men are so weak when a woman says she loves him.”

“… I know,” Aline said distantly. She did. She … She really did.

Arsenia grinned at her. Her skin was greenish now. Her teeth were … toothier. “I know you do,” she said, and Aline could tell it was with pride. Real, if quiet, pride. “I saw that. My people reported it. To save your other friend’s life, yes? A little lie. Some poison in the right cup. A key to free your friend from prison. I saw that, yes.”

Aline looked away. Ducked her head. “Drugs,” she said. “Not poison. I only put him to sleep for a while. I didn’t … I didn’t kill him.”

Tante laughed gently. “I know, dear heart,” she said. Brushing Aline’s cheek again. “You’re not your brother, or even me. You drew your lines and made your choices. Don’t worry about it. And tell your friend not to worry about it either. Commander Verine is a little too busy to be following either of you these days. It will be … some years, before he extricates himself. If he’s very good.”

Aline’s head snapped up. She snapped around, to stare at the woman. Arsenia stared back placidly. As flat and calm as the Petumno still. As prone to drowning people.

“You …” Aline started. She didn’t finish.

“I told him I’d look out for our children, dear heart,” the dragon told her. The _shadow chancellor_. The ancient advisor who’d guided their bloodstained efforts for as long as any Falone could remember. Right hand to every Falone head in memory. Tante Arsenia. The ‘advisor’ that not even the most vicious city enforcer, their own or anyone else’s, would cross without a reason. “Did you think that something as silly as running away would make me stop? You’ve made such interesting enemies, my dear. The game has been so very … _enlivening_ since you left. More fun than I’ve had in years. I do thank you, you know. Pettante is my home. My Diero’s home. But there’s only so long a dragon can play on its little board before she becomes … _extraordinarily bored._ ”

“Tante,” Aline whispered. Uselessly. The old woman tucked her hair behind her ear gently. Brushed her scales, once again.

“You look like him,” she said softly. Distantly. Almost tiredly. “Not the face, as much, but the eyes. The expression. That’s all Diero. He was such a foolish heart. As savage as the day was long, but … he could never hurt those he loved. We had such a good game, the pair of us. I wore … so many faces. All to kill him. Even the one who said she loved him. _Especially_ the one who said she loved him. And he offered up his life for her sake. Sold himself to save her. And when I changed in front of him. Showed him the depths of my betrayal. My magic, my power, my _poison_. Do you know what he said? Do you know what a foolish criminal said to the dragon who’d betrayed him?”

Aline shook her head mutely. Arsenia smiled. The helpless, heartbroken smile of a woman in love.

“He said, _I’m glad you’re safe_ ,” she said. That strange smile on her face. Vicious and lovely and sad. “He said, my love, I’m glad you’ll _always_ be safe. He’d been afraid, you see. He offered himself up to save me. The game we play is not good for those who love. But a dragon is something else. There’s nothing in this city that can see me dead. And he was happy about that. Even when I betrayed him. Even if I _killed_ him. He was still just happy … that no one could see me dead.”

And Aline … understood that. She really did. She’d grown up here. With Michello, with their mother, with the legacy of all their father’s many mistakes. She’d watched their mother become hard and vicious, never balking at anything. Michello had clearly gone much the same way. She’d … run away from that. From all of that. Tried to start again, start something else. With Pierre, with Quelenna.

But the ‘game’, as Tante called it, wasn’t safe outside of Pettante either. She’d thought, even with all she knew, all her family was, that it would be an adventure. A daring, different, _happy_ thing. Or least exciting. Thrilling. Like the stories. Just like the stories.

And then she’d poisoned a man to keep Pierre free. She’d sat and listened, one hard, horrible night, to everything that waited for Quelenna if she was ever foolish enough to stay too long in one place, to become too loud and too well-known, and draw all the wrong old eyes back upon her.

They were fragile. All of them. Far too fragile. And the game just wasn’t safe for those who loved.

She looked up at the portrait. At the ancient oils that had sat over the mantel for as long as she could remember, that they’d stared at, Michello and her both, for so many hours when they were children. Diero Falone stared back at her, all hard lines and smiling eyes. A familiar face. A familiar man. A man … that she hadn’t known at all. And suddenly wanted to.

“… Go live your life, my dear,” the dragon named Tante Arsenia said softly. Calling Aline back to her. Watching her with gentle, alien yellow eyes. “Forget about your brother, about Pettante. He’s an idiot, but I’ve steered stupider than him through this city’s game. It’s hardly difficult anymore. But you … Diero would be proud of you. Amused by you. Appalled, too. You would delight him. A better legacy than any he’s had in years. Set your rules, dear heart. Protect your friends. Play your game, win or lose, as only you can. It’s all any of us ever do. You’re no stain on his name. Trust me. He would be proud of you.”

Aline looked away from her. From the portrait, too. She looked away. Looked down into the fire, the flickering mess of light and shadow. All the old shadows of her childhood. And … some new ones, too. She curled her fists gently. Felt the rough edges of green scales along her thumb. The curl of magic under her skin. Remembered …

Slipping poison in a man’s cup. Not to kill him. Just enough to make him sleep. But poison, even still.

The two halves of her heritage. The two lines that came together in her blood. Crime and magic.

And maybe poison either way.

“… And you?” she asked quietly. Still staring into the fire, while a dragon, an ancient killer of men and women and anyone else who took her fancy, stood beside her. The old woman, the old killer, who’d raised her half her life. “Diero Falone didn’t start our line by himself. You said it yourself. If not for … if not for fate and a woman, he wouldn’t have lived past thirty-five. If a woman hadn’t loved him, and let him live. Do you think that woman would be …” A pause, and she smiled helplessly. “Do you think a woman like that would be proud of me … grandmother?”

A long pause, and then …

Then the dragon laughed. Low and vicious, and stepped close to wrap gentle arms around Aline’s shoulders from behind. To hug her close, like she had when Aline had been a little girl.

“Tante, if you please,” she murmured lightly. “Not ‘grandmother’. Tante will do. And pride is beside the point, dear heart. If you live, no one judges your efforts but you. Whether an old dragon would be proud of you is irrelevant. But rest assured. She does _love_ you. As much as she loved a foolish man two hundred years ago, and to just as lethal effect.”

She hummed, and leaned close to press a toothy kiss to Aline’s cheek. To brush green scales against green scales, ever so gently.

“Tell your friend not to worry about his old commander, my dear,” she whispered. “And tell … anyone who betrays you. Anyone who wears a pretty face, to leave you dead at the end. Tell them you have an old auntie in Pettante. Tell them she will pay for you. Tell them she will make _them_ pay for you. Until their ability to pay anything has long since run out.”

Aline closed her eyes. Curled her fists, even as she leaned in to Arsenia’s embrace. Rested her weight in her old advisor’s arms.

“… I have rules, Tante,” she whispered desperately. Exhaustedly. “I _want_ to have rules. I don’t want to … I don’t want to end up like Michello. Like mother. Even … Even you. I want to keep them safe. I would do anything to keep them safe. But I don’t want to …”

She’d still poisoned a man. No matter what, she’d still lied and seduced and drugged and robbed. She hadn’t wanted to bring Pierre and Quelenna here. Not to the house. Not to the funeral. She didn’t want them to _see_. What she came from. What she _was_. No matter how far she ran from it, what she still was. Falone, down to the bone. Even Michello was afraid of her. Her brother, her stupid, angry, idiot brother. He knew … that if it came to it, if he pushed her …

She didn’t want to be a monster. To be a _dragon_. Magic and poison and crime.

Arsenia stood quietly for a minute. Digesting that. Without a ripple, without a qualm. Placid as the Petumno. This time without drowning someone. Yet.

“He went straight for me,” she said softly. Finally. “Diero. I let him live. Of course I let him live. He loved me. I knew by then. He could never raise a hand to one he loved. Together, we remade the city. The best game of my life. But he had … ideas. Such silly ideas. Such a foolish heart. He gave me a house. A guild. A name. He wanted me to be safe. Our game isn’t good to those who love. He wanted me to be _safe_. For all that no one in our world could hope to kill me. He tried to protect a dragon by going straight. If I hadn’t loved him so very much, I would have killed him. He gave me a daughter. The most beautiful treasure of my entire life. I only forgave him because I wanted her safe too. And when she died … he only forgave me for what I did because he loved her too.”

Aline tipped her head up. To the painting, again. To her ancestor, the first of their ‘legitimate’ line. A criminal and a thief and, much later, the father of a murdered daughter. The husband of a dragon.

Diero Falone looked steadily back. All hard lines and smiling eyes.

“Play your game, my dear,” Arsenia whispered softly. “Set your rules, protect your friends. Win or lose by your own merits. But if you lose. If you do. Close your eyes, dear heart. Close your eyes, and say the word. And forgive me for what I do.”

Close your eyes. Hide and seek. See no evil. Close your eyes, say the word, and pretend it wasn’t you who told me what to do.

Aline smiled too. A stretched thing. Full of old despair. Pierre would recognise it. Quelenna too.

“No,” she said. Just as softly. To her old auntie. Her father’s right hand, her mother’s right hand. The shadow chancellor, the old killer who’d raised her half her life. She’d never run for her mother. Aline had never really been sure why, but after a while, especially once her father was gone, she’d never run for her mother. She’d run for a killer instead. She’d run for Tante Arsenia.

She’d poisoned a man for Pierre’s freedom. She didn’t want to know what she’d do for his death. Either of their deaths.

The game was never kind. And everyone she loved was far too fragile.

“No,” she said again. Softly. Sadly. _Determinedly_. Turning in a monster’s arms. “If I ever lose that much, Tante. If I ever fail that badly. I will keep my eyes wide open, and you will have to forgive _me_ for what I do beside you.”

Arsenia stared at her. Breathless. Such a vicious, tender look in her yellow eyes.

“You always were the spit of us,” she murmured distantly. Touching Aline’s cheek. “So much the spit of us. A foolish heart, and a dragon’s poison in your veins. Ah, love. No wonder your brother fears you. Nothing worse than a dragon who loves. And we’re the most patient, you know. My line. We favour poison. We take our blows, take our betrayals. And when the time is right, we put on our pretty faces, and plant the poison where it needs to go.”

“I know,” Aline said. And she did. She had. “I know, Tante. I know.”

The old dragon stared at her a moment more. _Smiled_ at her a moment more. And then, gently, yellow eyes melted away to brown. Green scales softened back to wrinkled skin. The dragon faded back, and only the old killer remained in place. The shadow chancellor. Tante Arsenia.

“Well then,” she said gently. Leaning up to press a gentle kiss to Aline’s brow. “I suppose, then, that if you are to keep your rules, you’d better go and win your game. Better things to do than sit with your old auntie. In your brother’s house, while he’s in the mood he’s in. Hmm?”

Aline blinked a bit, and then nodded. Straightened up. A Pettante duchess still, even if not in name.

“Yes,” she agreed. “You’re right. I’ve left my friends alone too long. We have work to do. I only came for the funeral.” She smiled placidly. “No offense, Tante, of course. To my brother either. You’ll give him my regards?”

Tante grinned. Toothily. “Oh yes, my dear,” she assured. “Every regard in the world. You needn’t worry. He’s not the brightest of our line, but I won’t let the little idiot die now. Nor … overstep himself, either. He has ideas, your brother. Unlike Diero’s, they’re not the sort of foolishness I’m inclined to indulge.”

Said so very, very placidly. Calm as the Petumno. Oh Michello, Aline thought wryly. Forgiving him more in this moment than any since the funeral, if only because he was so very, very doomed. You always had to have pity for the doomed.

_Michello, my brother. My childhood companion. You always were such an idiot._

And Aline, apparently, like both sides of her lineage, had always been such foolish monster at heart.

**Author's Note:**

> AKA that feeling when you go home to your crime lord family and realise that your favourite 'auntie' is your 600-year-old utterly amoral green dragoness ancestor who loves you unconditionally and is perfectly willing to quietly _take care of things_ for you, no matter what your morals might want to say about it


End file.
